Boxed In
by MJPipe
Summary: Matt, a popular college student, watches the tape and discovers it's secrets. When it appears he can't seem to get anyone to watch it, he tries to find another, less conventional way to stay alive.


I sincerely thank youfor clicking a mouse in this direction and I hope you read and enjoy the whole story, I know it's a bit big though. This is my first submitted fanfic anddefinitely the best thing I've ever written, but if anybody has any constructive criticism to offer I will be very, very grateful indeed.

Ifyou should find anyparts of this story confusing, I've added some notes at the end to hopefully clear up any weirdness. There's also a few references to Gothic culture that could be implied as an attack. If so, I'm sorry butthis is not what I intend, it is merely what the characters involvedare like but feel free to judge for yourselves.

This story is based on the American version of The Ring, not Ringu.

Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters presented in this story, even if I invented them (this is fan fiction). The Girl (Samara) is a trademark of DreamWorks LLC (2002).

* * *

Boxed In

Tuesday, 15th April.

I'm really looking forward to going out tonight. Matt's got this new videotape (I can't believe he hasn't got a DVD recorder yet, talk about stuck in the Stone Age!) that he's been screaming about for days now like I really got to see it, although it's not as if he even seems to like the movie, he hasn't even told me what's in it! I think he said it was a horror flick or something, which I LOVE! He says I really need to experience this like my life depends on it. I wonder if this really is all about some dumb movie, I guess there's only one way to find out! Still, all of this feels really weird. We haven't spoken to each other for months, actually, for over a year and we used to be such good friends at high school. I still feel pretty guilty about what I did but it's all in the past, dead and buried, Matt himself said so, can't ask for better forgiveness than that can I?

Right, I'm off.

Bye-bye diary!

Annabel looked up at her clock, biting back a shriek. The light sky had tricked her into thinking it was still early.

"Christ nine Already! Jeez."

She slammed her diary shut, rolled off her unmade mattress and dived into the pine wardrobe standing behind her. Coat hangers and dark coloured clothing flew out like crows, arcing high before crashing into a dead heap on her bed. Soon after the chaos, Annabel selected what appeared to be the last few articles left and put them on. She wore long johns under a short denim skirt, to cover up her chubby legs, and threw on a baggy woolly sweater, probably stolen from her older brother. The jumper covered up her chubby arms too.

She checked her extensive layers of make up; not too gothic; Annabel didn't want to seem too gothic. Trying to make a conscious effort to appear fashionable for Matt was hard work. She was aiming for something alternative but not quite anti-social.

Hurrying out the room, Annabel grabbed the jacket, hanging lifeless over the banister and checked its contents as she skipped downstairs two at a time. The jacket was long and black and there were many pockets, the fact that it had metal studs and buttons that rattled as it moved made it easy to hide stuff like lighters, small bongs and car keys. She had two cell phones in there.

"Okay. Phone? Check. Keys…? Check. "She padded her inside right breast pocket. "Smokes" She whispered, "Check."

Grinning like a devil pre-torture session, she stepped carefully into her chunky ankle boots waiting patiently by the front door. Six months on and she still wasn't used to them.

"Okay Mom, Pops I'll be round Matt's!" She opened the door.

"Alright dear, don't be-"

SLAM

"…late."

In all of my favourite stories the good person always beats the bad person. I like them because they remind me that the world is a good place, and that the bad people get punished for doing the wrong thing. But Mommy used to tell me they're only stories.

Matt is a very impatient person who generally acts on a whim, so when nothing was happening time passed like it had a spanner caught in its gears. He was sitting at a desk, set up against a window looking outside the front of his parent's house. The driveway was empty because Father and Mother were around the Joneses for dinner. This happened often. Meanwhile, Matt watched vigilantly, hoping to catch Annabel come trotting around the hedge.

Annabel had never been the most reliable person in his book. He entertained the possibility that she'd forgotten about this evening altogether.

That would be so typical, he thought, so typical of her.

Because he found it hard to keep himself occupied, Matt attempted to build a castle out of an old pack of playing cards. It wasn't really working out, his hands were shaking and they had become clammy with sweat so his fingers stuck to every card he touched, usually resulting in the castle's destruction. He was most certainly frustrated but he was determined to remain focussed. The sun was beginning to come down and he couldn't bear to look at his reflection in the glass, not anymore. He might see The Girl again, waiting behind his shoulder, just as she had been for days now.

Sweat began to form in beads on Matt's forehead as the slight headache he'd been quietly nursing since Sunday suddenly intensified. The veins that fed his scalp felt strangled and he could hear the valves throbbing loudly, one laboured beat after another. The noise was irritating. The castle kept falling. Annabel was not here yet.

"Damn the freaking cards. Goddamn-it!" He swept them aside with an outstretched arm born of anger and they scattered all over the floor.

It was a good thing Matt's Father wasn't home because there was no way he would put up with that kind of blasphemy. Father Creek, as his title suggests, is a priest and a proud, devout one at that. Matt didn't believe in God because he felt there was no evidence to support His existence. If he had any faith at all, it had been on hiatus, especially since Saturday.

Matt, for all his faults, is a very popular boy at college and he holds some sway. He is so strongly opinionated that other students flock to him to see what the current trends are, or what music can be considered credible enough to be seen listening to. People want his approval. It's safe to say that Matt never had a Saturday night unscheduled for years, he is always at a gathering somewhere.

The most recent somewhere was at Jon's. Jon doesn't have a whole lot going for him beyond college other than a career as a janitor, something he already does twice a week for spare cash. He spends his wages on weed, to forget about future's responsibilities and to appreciate the now. A friend of a friend recognised this, and passed Jon a video that could get him accepted amongst an esteemed fraternity at the local university, virtually guaranteeing his induction AND his parents admiration in one foul stinking swoop. All he's got to do is watch the tape and show it to someone else soon after, like a chain letter.

So naturally, Jon watched the tape. He got the phone call. He was just too high to realise the implications it held for him, he thought it was pretty cool actually.

Come Saturday it was his turn to play host. He found the video stuffed in a pile under a coffee table and, suddenly remembering what his friend of a friend had said, decided to play it for the punters.

"Dudes, I got this tape from like, nowhere man…"

Everyone saw it. Matt complained that it was self-indulgent art crap and that it had brutally stolen two minutes of his short life and he wanted them back, pronto. Then he answered Jon's phone.

Everything became simple and complex all in that one moment. He heard her voice like ice and just knew this was no prank, like a major career down the drain with nothing he could do, his life had taken an unexpected turn.

He checked the previous caller's number but it made no sense, the automated voice reading came back strangely, underlined with a staccato bass line that perverted the voice into something less monotone, and more alive

None of Matt's friends have seen him since he left that night. That was five days ago, it's now Thursday.

Mommy said 'you should always treat people the way they treat you'. I saw people in the city nearly every day and I was always polite to them so that they would be polite back to me. Mommy lied. I know she did because she said she loved me, and she killed me. I was in the wet place for a week and no one came to save me, not Mommy, not Daddy, even though I was nice to everyone.

She missed the bus by seconds, mere seconds but would the driver politely stop? No. No he didn't, why break a heritage?

That was half an hour ago and as a result Annabel is strolling the sidewalk in the dark, kicking garbage for fun, still trying to get to Matt's house. This meant that she had to haul herself another damn mile across town, taking maybe an extra thirty minutes or so.

She lit her third cigarette, coughing spit as she took the first drag. Annabel smoked too much, even her friends thought so, but her long, white sticks of self-destruction bought her that vital street cred amongst passing vagrants and hooligans. Fags were a hobby that took up all of her allowance, her dinner money and her appetite but this was fine by her; she thought she was too fat anyway.

The Lee sisters thought so too, as did the cheerleaders/cultists that hung on the pair's every word like Jesus' disciples. The glamour-pack came into view from around the next corner.

In the presence of popularity, at this moment Annabel was quite proud where she would've normally felt intimidated or inadequate. She gained strength from the fact that she was on her way to see Matt, not them. She would be the first person to see Matt all week in fact. Considering this truth confused Annabel because Matt was such an outgoing guy, he had plenty of other friends, why her?

Pivoting to cross the road, she wondered what he thought of Goths. She stepped off the curb, pondering whether she'd actually lost any weight. Ignoring two big, round and bright headlights, Annabel continued across the road. The camper van couldn't have stopped in time, or swerved around her; it was full of dope heads anyway.

The metallic thud from Annabel's body woke them up a bit.

For the next two weeks Annabel would be spending quality time in self-assessment, she wouldn't have to worry about adjusting her personality to suit her 'friends', and if that didn't work out, she'd surely lose some weight.

I like to watch people when they know they are going to die. I don't think people know they are going to die, even though they see it every day on the news and in the papers, and they often wish to die in their sleep, without even realising it. Nowadays, when they play my game they know they might be able to win but they have to sacrifice someone else. It's funny how quickly good people can turn bad.

Walking through the field was a surreal experience, assuming it was a field; there were no trees to be seen for miles, almost like a void, granting a perverse sense of freedom through perfect isolation. The temperature was comfortable yet the grass took on the glassy qualities of a deep frost, dark sky contrasting the ground's vast whiteness. Matt crunched his way along barefoot leaving no footprints. He didn't think about where he was headed, and he didn't know where he came from but he knew he had to keep moving.

As soon as Matt became aware that he was meandering he turned around, yet he did not stop, he continued on in the same direction by taking unsure backward steps, as if he couldn't control his own body's momentum. Distance remained constant. Resigning himself to this fact for now, he turned back but as his eyes focussed on the invisible path that lay in front of him, a tiny copse of a few crystalline bonsai trees appeared not a hundred paces from his current position.

As if to make up for Matt's relaxed, monotonous strides, the copse loomed in faster than it feasibly could have. Now the once delicate bonsais looked more like great oaken wonders, strong and thick trunks suggesting a steadfastness that it would be futile to test. It was not long before he was among the trees, which sprawled in all directions like the grass had done previously. This forest was darker in contrast, taking on a sinister décor, more resembling the snow of a failing television. Matt noticed the farthest leaves had become less organic, more pixellated in appearance, tiny white squares over a black nothingness of bark and shadow.

He picked up a nearby leaf that lay curled up dead on the ground. It rumbled excitedly in his hand and altered the reality around it. Suddenly Matt's fingers became distorted and looked like slow changing, knobbly shapes. He dropped the leaf quickly and recoiled in horror. Looking back at his fingers he noted that they had frozen mid-distortion, jutting out in all the wrong places, knuckles becoming flesh-coloured mountain ranges, his nails a blurred and lumpy parody of their correct form.

Matt fell into panic when he again spotted the leaf, trying to claw itself across the grass after him, using its curly tip as a hook. It moved as if powered by fifties-era animatronics. The leaf's actions were slow and crooked as though the act of actually having to harm Matt would cause it further torment, yet it was determined in its cause and it refused to stop, not even when Matt threw sticks in its path, or pelted it with handfuls of dirt. He even tried to kick a hole deep enough with which to bury it, using his bare feet, but his toes contorted and broke under the stress, a couple of them fell off like drips off a leaky tap and dark red droplets of claret pebble dashed the lifeless, greying grass. He turned and hopped away on one leg for as far as he could until he collapsed, in a Twilight Zone twist of sick, malevolent randomness his knee separated clean from his shin. Feeling his blood keenly gushing out from his leg like water through a broken dam, dampening the floor around him and dissolving any energy he had left, he watched, terrified as the leaf bore down on his still standing appendage, quickly writhing into something a little like bogwood. And then he woke up.

Five am: Matt's covers and mattress were soaked through and through. He had clearly been sweating profusely and he soon discovered that he had wet himself as the unmistakable scent of fresh urine wafted upwards. This was probably what actually disturbed him from a much-needed rest, deep and frightening as it was. Frustrated, Matt got up to run a bath immediately.

The following morning Matt went back to school for a short visit. Matt's remaining time had become too important to waste on learning junk he believed he knew already. His eyes had an intense edge and they darted back and forth, relentlessly scanning the corridors.

His reason for going was to track down Annabel and find out the unacceptable reason she didn't attend his house the previous evening. The smarter students generally stayed out of his path but any that tried to block him, intentionally or otherwise, got unceremoniously forced out of the way. Even though he had many friends Matt had looked anything but social since Saturday, and he'd been called a jerk more times in that short period then than he had been in his entire life. Some of Annabel's 'Goth' friends regarded him suspiciously as he passed them by, but Goths - didn't they always? Deciding against just simply ignoring them like he had everyone else, he approached them, gathering they might know where she could be found.

As he got closer he noticed that one of the girls had thick lines of mascara streaked down her puffy cheeks. In all likelihood that might just be her own 'individual' style of applying makeup, but then again she could be crying. His curiosity piqued, Matt stormed into grilling mode.

"What's your problem huh?" he said, as indifferently as possible. "Come on. What's up? Why are you crying?" Indeed she was crying.

One of the other girls squinted her eyes fiercely at him. "Didn't you hear?" she said.

"I was talking to her, okay."

"Whatev-"

"Where's that stupid piglet Annabel? Come on, snap out of it. Stop crying eh?"

Her friend re-interjected "You god-damn moron, come on Emmie, you don't have to put up with this jerk off."

"Hey, let her talk. What's she afraid of? Maybe I can put her out of her freakin' misery."

Emmie's friend tried to move between her and Matt, but Emmie herself outstretched an arm to prevent them, from becoming completely blocked off from one another.

"I'm not afraid of you." She said sniffing away the tears. "Really, I should be the one asking questions. Annie said she was going to your house last night. She said that YOU asked her round. She hoped you'd forgive her for ruining that crappy damn project that you'd finished over a freaking. YEAR. AGO!"

"Come on Emmie, calm down."

"That project you never got over, did you? Did you!" She began to sob again. "Now she's in a freaking coma. All because of you…"

"Shut up" he replied, He turned on his heel and walked away.

Daddy hated me. He hated me because I was stronger than he was, when he was alive. If you're a Mommy or a Daddy then you should want your child to be stronger, because they should live longer than you. If they don't, then it's all you're fault because you weren't there for them when they needed you.

Matt and his father were enjoying their evening meal.

"Your Mother tells me you haven't been going to school, son." Father Creek beckoned a response.

Matt didn't look up from his plate. He saw the ever-present ghost of the girl reflected in the gravy. "As a matter of fact today I did."

"For a whole half hour. What's eating you Matthew, you've been getting up too early and you've got rings around your eyes. You need more rest. I think you should take another week off college to regroup."

Matt snickered with the bitter irony. He didn't have another week.

"Look. Father. I'm fine. Just – just leave me be. I think I maybe have a cold or something. Nothing serious. Don't worry about it."

"Well I can't let you skip your education for the sake of a cold. I haven't seen you sneezing either. You want to tell me something?"

Matt didn't hear the words the same way they came out of his Father's mouth. "Do you want to make a confession?" was how he heard it.

"No. There-"

"Come on I'm waiting."

"You just can't trust me can you? You never believe what I have to say? There's nothing wrong with me for God's sake."

The words felt bad to Matt even as they left his mouth. They hung in the air for a bleak moment like an echo.

Father Creek visibly strained to avoid raising his voice. "Matthew I think you should go to your room to think about what you just said."

"You've never trusted me. Not for my entire life. I can't do anything right in the face of your all-powerful spiritual omnipresence can I?"

"Go to your room now."

"You think you're so high and mighty, preaching about your so-called 'God' to everyone. Thinking you're better than others when you're clearly not. You're nothing but another person, a hamster in a wheel."

"Matthew!"

"Our time is so short and you think you're doing something significant in the world. Well I don't and I never have.

"I hate God."

Father Creek's voice rose in tone and in pitch. "I've raised you better than-"

"Don't be silly. You'd sell us out any day if you thought it'd improve your… status in the hierarchy of God or something. You'd do it to get into Heaven.

Father Creek stood up tall, an example of authority. His brow threatened extreme discipline to come. "Go – To – Your – Room. Right now!"

Matt looked up into his Father's eyes with the defiance of Lucifer. He stood up quickly and knocked his chair over behind him.

"Gladly."

Matt was upstairs in his room, sitting at his work desk in front of a large mirror he would not look at. It was still bright outside and the sun shone proudly through his curtains even though they were drawn, bathing the room in a warm, yellow light. Regardless of the pleasant atmosphere, Matt was not likely to break a smile.

He knew he needed a plan if he was going to beat this thing but he wasn't sure how. He thought back to early Monday morning, when he'd frantically called Jon after that night's dream, the first time he saw The Girl.

"Come on Jon. Come on…"

Click "Uh. Yuh?"

"Jon. It's Matt. Listen. That video we watched."

"That art-garbage?"

"Yeah."

"What about it?"

"Uh. Um did your friends tell you anything odd about it?"

"Do you know what time it is?"

"No but it doesn't matter. Just tell me about it. Now."

"Oh ok brother. Jeez. Uh, let me think here… Yeah. Uh. If you watch the tape you've got somethin' like a week to show someone else a copy or you'll get some bad luck or somethin'. Y'know, just like them chain letters? If you do you pass on the bad luck. I got a phone call, said I was gonna die. That killed me man."

"Hmm. A copy huh?"

"Yeah. My man said that if I did I'd get into university. Dude, that reminds me, I gotta let him know about that."

"Right. So if I show someone else a copy, I'll be okay. Mind if I show you?"

"Oh. Uh-nuh man. You've got to show it to someone who didn't already see it. I already done seen it and passed it on so I don't count anymore."

"How the hell do you know?"

"You wanna get into Uni don't you?"

"No."

"Oh. Right. If you want me to see it again that's no big. Come over this afternoon, I'll give you the tape and then you need to make a copy. And bring something spicy back with you if you know what I mean, then I'll do it."

"Not a problem Jon. You know I got all the bases covered. Thanks man."

"It's nothin'. Catch you later, after my beauty sleep. Peace."

"Later."

Click

That had given Matt some brief comfort. Unfortunately for him the tape didn't work. The first thing he had to do was collect it. As soon as he got it home Matt plugged it into his VCR and watched it again, to make sure it wasn't damaged in any way. The actual images in the film didn't bother Matt in the slightest and being a clever breed he understood that the pictures were just short, disjointed scenes intended to shock, even when The Girl appears in the mirror, seeing her on film isn't anywhere near as scary as seeing her in your actual reflection, looking over your shoulder like Death.

When Matt was certain of the video's quality he made a recording, testing it half a dozen times to make sure it was exactly right. When he got the tape back to Jon's however, he was faced with insurmountable problems. The video player jammed, fuses blew and the television failed to tune in properly but all of this was immaterial, determination saw him through. The final insult was when the tape actually did begin to play but showed something Matt had recorded earlier, they tried time and time again but his copied film, the images, had disappeared.

After Matt had unleashed his frustration on the furniture back at home he decided to try the tape again. Of course, it worked perfectly.

He tried a few other things but none of them worked. He had given up plotting to kill Jon in revenge with the tape because it never worked, wherever he showed him. More recently he'd tried to lure Annabel, a girl he hated into watching it and she evaded death by falling into a coma, having been hit by some hippies Volkswagen.

Someone's trying to tell me something, he thought. He knew he would have to face his fears eventually, he knew it in his gut. He built a little resolve and raised his chin up to look at his reflection. It had been a few days since Matt had done this last. His focus was not immediately drawn to his own face. The Girl was there; stooped over, unnaturally still in the background, as always in the open space behind him, dignified and horrible and hidden behind her long, black hair in that dirty white dress. He had to force his gaze to himself.

Matt looked dishevelled, pale and dying. Two eyes glossy and white like marbles, surrounded by thick, dark shadows that spread outwards like TNT blasts. His cheeks were a pallid roadmap of thinly stretched blood vessels that held his face together and his cracked lips no longer stood apart from his skin. No comb had touched his head of hair for days and it had long lost its lustre. He used to take such good care of himself, but now he looked like a drug addict involuntarily stuck on a cold turkey.

His mind had overloaded with both possibilities and the lack of, all at once, his ego, his id and his superego colliding and calculating and trying so very hard to make the most out of every single idea. An atmosphere of doubt crept over him. His thoughts began to speak themselves.

"I should go now. Look at yourself."

He opened and reached into a drawer underneath his desk, taking out a good, heavy-duty craft knife, the sort you'd use to cut carpets.

"It's bad for me. I can't let her win."

The Girl, over his shoulder, took a step forwards.

He noticed the movement and tightly clamped his eyelids together. He couldn't deal with her constant presence and he needed to be alone, he needed some time to sleep.

The cold metal casing of the knife lay heavy in Matt's grasp. He opened his eyes back up and fell into a trance, looking down at the taught wrist responsible for the blade. He studied the hairs and imperfections of the skin, the structure of his muscles, his tendons, and then, getting deeper he distinguished his blue arteries with his life still coursing through them. He imagined the blood, his blood, his essence, reaching his hand after the long trek from the heart. The sheer effort his own cells put in 24-7 to ensure that Matt remained alive and well. He was about to let them all down. He was about to take control and kill himself.

The knife, in all its silver glory, with all its power, the power Matt now wielded. It could determine his fate. That single object could be the most important factor in Matt's life and the only thing holding it together was a single Philips bolt, a grubby bolt with a cross, a hypnotic cross, right in the center.

"A cross…"

Then suddenly, a moment of severe clarity occurred.

Annabel lay being fed intravenously at the hospital, bed-ridden in the clutches of a deep coma. The doctors fought hard to stop the internal bleeding and the seizures but thankfully, the consensus was that she'd turn out okay.

A van of stoners, nodding their heads to some hip hop funk, sped quickly through the night of Thursday 15th April. They were on their way to a late night strip club, first time any of them had been and they all carried fake identification. Don, at the wheel, had been driving steadily all the way from his house, regardless of the fact the inside of the van was cloudier than the tip of Mt Everest. The intro-sirens of sound off promising a proper club-banger and the crew of five bob their heads in sync to the sound. Don tries to match up to Method Man's verse but keeps losing his breath. A shadow creeps out in front of him and the whole camper feels impact. He brakes.

"Jon. Hey Jon. Look at me for a sec'. That was a load of bull, art student crap. What do you mean the scariest thing you ever seen?"

"Just get the damn phone fool."

Click "Hey?"

"Seven days…" Click

Don stops smoking weed and, after a brief struggle with depression trades in the van to set up a savings account. He tries harder at school and eventually gets into college, forever humbled by his stupid, stupid mistakes of the past. He never forgets the accident but he does forget his former friends.

Matt stops interacting with others, losing the authority and opinions he had over other student's tastes. They are free to become individuals and now the school has taken its first step to breaking the clique culture it so advocates, the culture Matt was such a strong part of. Jocks, Cheerleaders, Skaters and Goths are all slightly less concerned with each other.

Annabel wakes up from her coma no longer a girl, now a woman, born again. She has lost a little weight but she has to put that back on, to get healthy. She smokes less, tells her parents her secrets and dresses the way she wants. She is always home before 10pm.

Matt blinked.

Matt held the knife up before him, looking squarely at the cross. He felt his father's stalwart religious beliefs, so far removed from his own philosophy, now made perfect sense to him. Whether it was madness leaking into Matt's brain from the anxiety or simply a longing desire for life after death, he didn't know or care. Matt now believed he had been on a mission from the start, a holy messenger, his life sacrificed to deliver others onto the right path.

He remembered the sixth commandment (Father Creek kept a plaque on his wall), the one that read - thou shall not kill. The only one Matt had placed true importance in, he agreed that it is a mortal sin to take away someone's existence, even someone you really despise, even a killer's, especially your own.

Matt dropped the knife to the floor and looked to his bare wrist. He cursed himself for being so shallow and self-absorbed and pathetic. Matt had to win. He had to because God was there for him, because God stopped Matt from committing sins enough to condemn him to an eternity in hell.

Good people turn bad, not the other way around. I know this because I've made all kinds of people die and none of them were very nice. Bad people turn things around to suit themselves.

Matt had slept well, nevertheless he woke up at 4 am but this time it was a deliberate action. He was going to leave his house without his family knowing. He didn't say goodbye; too much risk. There was no way Matt wanted his parents to know about his disappearance in case they tried to find him. What he was going to do he knew would be considered far from sane, even a man who believed in angels and demons would think so, and if they were to trace his abnormal behaviour back to the tape, they might just watch it.

That was the last thing Matt wanted, the first thing was to vanquish The Girl with his own wits otherwise he feared the victory wouldn't really be his.

He knew of a dingy little motel a few miles across town. He'd once taken an ex-girlfriend over there so he didn't have any fond memories of the place but it stuck in his mind regardless. He'd stolen some money from his parents, enough to pay for the room for a week and more besides. It's okay, he felt sure God would understand. The room had running water and electricity but thanks to the dreams he'd been having he disconnected those immediately and destroyed anything that might suddenly become possessed, like the television. He put these things in a heap over to one side of the room to dismantle even further later, for when he came back from the store.

He left the motel for the store and ten minutes later, he was there. It was only a short hike through the woods. Perfect, he thought, no one would see me on the way back.

As soon as he entered the store he instantly grabbed a cart and removed the list from his pocket, working methodically so as to make sure he didn't miss anything. It was still pretty early, about seven o'clock and he was the only customer in there. The clerk fixed Matt with a concerned look as he approached the hatchets, taking one off and continued to scour the shop merrily.

"You alright over there, mister?" said the assistant.

Matt nodded. "I'm good. I'll be over soon."

Grabbing one last item he pushed the cart over to the counter with the only register available. The clerk scanned each item singularly and wondered what on Earth this young guy was going to do with them.

"Planning a fun afternoon."

"You bet."

"What's a hatchet have in common with cement?"

"Hey. You work in the store man."

"I sure do but I like to figure out how my customers use the stuff they buy, helps me to assist folks who might not have the required know-how."

"Good attitude" said Matt.

The assistant nodded, then waited for a response. Nothing came.

"Well?"

"I'm helping a friend to build a hut, for his kids." Keep it simple thought Matt. He doesn't want to bury himself with lies.

"And the hatchet?"

"What do you think?"

"I'm trying to see what you think."

Don't tell him it's none of his business, the nosy damn fool. "Man, I just need me one o' these." He flashed the clerk a grin. "Firewood."

"Fair enough" The clerk figured Matt older than 18 so he didn't see a problem in letting him have the little, lethal axe. He sure as hell wouldn't get in trouble. "Forty-Six bucks partner."

"There you go… buddy."

"Thirty, forty, fifty… Four bucks change, need a receipt?"

"Nope. Thanks."

The clerk watched as Matt, his back to him, casually left the store. He couldn't see Matt mouth the words loser as he walked out.

His next predicament was to get all this stuff back to the motel. It was a lot of heavy equipment. He could make several trips but then he couldn't guarantee that his equipment would be safe, he only had a finite amount of cash. It might also look weird to repeatedly sneak and forth through the woods, he didn't want to look a creep.

"What have I got to lose?"

Matt made sure that the only person working in the store was the lone sales assistant. A couple of other people had entered now so Matt waited for one of them to go up to the counter. Luckily one of the customers took the clerk's attentions elsewhere and he had to leave the register. Matt didn't waste a second. He stole the trolley, took it with him.

Fifteen minutes later and Matt was back at the motel room smashing up anything electrical with his hatchet. He sat there in the center of the garbage heap of metal and plastic like a busy child. It is very cathartic to break things pointlessly he thought. Matt was going to invest in some Industrial Metal, or maybe some Punk instead - that was less extreme, when he eventually returned to reality.

Satisfied with the results; a bunch of tiny, useless shards of circuit board, Matt moved onto the next phase of his plan. He got organised, kicking all the plastic and metal bits to the nearest side of the room and then laid out half a dozen builder's buckets. He poured out a measurement of two parts instant cement mix into each of them, and then added a third part of distilled water before mixing thoroughly. From these he would construct his walls, around himself. He left the buckets for a little while and first built his foundations out of wood and nails. He did this quickly and efficiently and it wasn't long before his wooden panel framework was up. It's remarkable how long work around the home can take to get finished, although Matt did have the good incentive that in fifteen hours time, he may be dead.

He only needed to take two things into the 'box' with him, one bucket of cement mix and a small digital clock. This would tell him when it should be okay to finally emerge from the expected siege, but he would give himself a day or so extra to wait, to make sure whatever it was would give up and leave him alone once and for all.

He filled in the last piece of wall hoping that fourteen hours was enough time for it to set adequately enough to stop anything, spectral or physical, getting through to him.

I'm different to everybody else. I can be in lots of places all at one time, and I can see all these places in my mind. All the people that deserve to be punished because they have all done bad things, wrong things, including everybody, every single person, no matter who or where they are.

It's right to treat people the way they treat others. That's how Mommy taught me. And everybody's done something wrong.

I see their past when they see mine. It's wrong for them to pry. That's what Mommy and Daddy told them reporters.

It's wrong for them to avoid punishment. That's what Daddy said when I was bad and he took me to those people in that white place.

The people in the white place said I have a gift. When they wanted me to do something they said it's wrong not to share it and keep it to myself, because I could make the world a better place if I use it wisely.

It's not wise to use my gift to hurt the good people. That would be wrong too. But I have never met a person who was better than my Mommy was, and she killed me, her only child.

When I punish somebody, I want all of them to know they've been bad. I've punished Parents who have left their children, people who have done bad things like take drugs, grown ups and young people that have hurt or bullied others to get money and stuff, nasty strangers that only come out when it's dark and angry people who take their problems out on everybody else. The bad thing is that all these people know they have done something wrong, and they won't do anything to make up for it.

I don't know what the time is but I know that Matthew Creek's time is up. He's had his last seven days to make things right. He hasn't made anything right. A girl is in Hospital and a boy wants to kill himself. Matthew wanted to kill himself because he got scared but I could not let him escape.

I came out in a room that was a long way away from him so I had to walk. It was dark outside so I didn't see anyone. It was cold too and my feet began to hurt from all the walking I had to do.

When I got there I saw a big square made out of soft stone. The water in the stone was empty and horrible. I wanted to punch through but I couldn't bear to let the water get stuck on me.

In the end I had to go somewhere else.

Matt decided to hit the hay at nine o'clock. It could potentially cut his time short by two hours but he figured he'd rather not experience the finality of death, he'd prefer the potentially temporary stasis of sleep like most other people. So come eleven twenty-four pm, he never felt the cold presence of The Girl, he never heard the high-pitched buzzing that accompanied her whenever she entered a confined space, and he never even realised she was in the same room as him. He was safely contained in the box.

Matt stood on a busy grey paving-slab sidewalk, under a cloudy grey sky, watching people in grey shirts, grey suits and grey ties not walk, but march, and they marched all over the place, for as far as he could see, around every corner and down every alleyway like crowded ants.

He didn't know what to do or where to go but he had to move otherwise the steady stream of businessmen and women might stomp and squash him flat. There was no immediate path to follow so he let someone overtake him and he simply followed.

He followed a woman, she looked middle-aged and frisky, the sort that was probably still up for a party to show off the nose job. Her hair instantly changed from grey to black and she turned around to stare right into Matt's face as if to scrutinise his every pore.

Just as suddenly she turned around again and continued to march and Matt noticed she had a waist long ponytail. She swiftly strode up a short flight of grey marble stairs and opened the huge oaken door, leading Matt into a large, sprawling hallway. As he glanced around he noticed that the floor and the walls had a checked pattern much like that of a chessboard only the divisions were rectangular instead of square. There were four squared, grey pillars that stretched up to outer space and he wondered if there were builders up there, continually stacking block after block until they died and were replaced, maybe they were immortal?

He gazed up into the blackness, expecting something to fall on him but it never did. Instead he began to fall, upside down into the space. Flapping madly to try and stop, or fly, or at least slow his descent but it was of course no use. Wincing as he braced for a painful impact Matt found another kind of darkness, the close, calming darkness that can only be found inside your closed eyelids. When he opened them again, he was so frightened at what he saw, so scared his neck muscles contracted sharply, and his entire body had soon locked into place. Unable to close or move his eyes again Matt was forced to look directly at a well he'd seen before.

He knew exactly where he had seen it.

The forest surrounding him was so still it defied physics, as if paused in place. But this was merely brief. A thick stone disc sealing the well, began to slide slowly but surely from its perch until it fell off. A dirty, nail-less hand disappeared back down the well.

Matt began to move toward the well. He couldn't fight back. His muscles were still stiff as new rope. He knew he was being pushed by someone, he could feel their cold, small fingers digging deeply into his back, right through his ribs. He wouldn't be surprised if the assailant was unable to pull their hands free of him, wrist deep in his lungs.

As the well came up to greet him, there was no resistance. Matt was bowled over, straight down the shaft, all the while in fear of the jagged walls of stone cracking his skull open, or dislocating a shoulder, breaking a collarbone, tearing a gash in his skin. Before long he felt the cold greeting of old stagnant water.

Matt woke up in the box, damp and cold from sweat. No, not sweat, it smelt like stagnant water and he was sitting waist deep in it.

He knocked on the walls, they should still have been soft but they weren't, they were iron hard, harder than they could ever have been, hard like they'd spent hundreds of years maturing, hard like natural rock.

"Oh God no."

"Matthew Creek will be remembered as a popular college student. One of those rare things, he achieved good grades and he was proficient in sports. Sometimes he was brash, even arrogant but then all great men are. His attitude was born of a self-importance that carried the world on its shoulders. That attitude would have propelled him forwards to attain incredible feats of humanitarianism, feats that mankind could no doubt benefit from. He was a great example but most important of all, to me, he was my son."

Matt's funeral had a respectable turn out, he would have been pleased at most things and disappointed at a few others, for example the name on the gravestone was 'Matthew' rather than the more formal version he preferred, but then it was a purely aesthetic thing, and towards the end he didn't care much for appearance and thought it ultimately puerile.

The world certainly turned out the way he envisioned. Annabel woke up, and she definitely hated Matt for what he tried to do to her, Jon filled her in after he heard about the whole affair. Regardless she pointed life in the direction she wanted it to go in and refused to let others influence her. She became a strong, independent woman and set new boundaries in journalism. Don started higher education but not until he could finish school after a yearlong stint in a psychiatric ward for depression. He damaged his vocal chords trying to hang himself. The only thing to shake him up out of it was when Annabel wrote a letter forgiving him for his misdeeds. They became pen pals and remained friends even if they never did meet in person.

As for Matt and his self-imposed quest to purge the world of a demon, he forgot one very, very critical factor. Fatal you might say. Eight of his friends died one week after having watched the tape. Matt survived for two. They shared the symptoms, the nightmares. They died while Matt slept and dreamt of grey people. He never told them about the phone call, he never told them they would be dead soon. Jon simply forgot to. He won't ever put the pieces together, even on death row for multiple murders. At least he'll be getting three square meals.

Life after death, the ultimate question. Matt found faith before he died, right before he died, when he knew he was going to die. Did he even know if he really believed in God?

Where do you think Matt ended up?

Epilogue

The snitch: Saturday 8th May

College Student Suffocates in Stonewalled Coffin

Coroners are left stunned by a bizarre suicide in the local area. A student, one Matthew Samuel Creek, was found dead on May 1st, encased in a tomb built of industrial sand and cement mix and wood, presumably bought from nearby hardware store, David's Nails. David Kapowski, owner of the store had this statement to make: "One of my assistants served Matthew almost a week exactly before the discovery of his death. He bought about fifty dollars worth of equipment, mainly sand and cement, wood and a few tools. A clock was purchased as well, for some reason. My assistant was suspicious of Matthew's presence in our store, especially when he approached, and eventually paid for, a hatchet."

When asked why his assistant allowed a minor to walk out the store with a hatchet, David merely replied: "No comment." No wonder.

Matthew's parents, among them Father Creek, a local priest declined to offer us an interview but would grant us a couple of lines hard fought dialogue. "Matt was a great son to us and we know he is resting in peace, with God, in heaven." Typical of any parents I'm sure you'll agree, but unfortunately none of the above point to the fact that Matthew was undergoing some severe stress, or emotional trauma of some type. His girlfriend, Annabel Wendelson refused to shed any more light on the events, as do his fellow students. Their guilty silence an obvious attempt to cover up the truth, a symptom of avoiding blame, blame that they bullied Matthew into building his own house, in a room, in a motel, to keep the 'badness' of the outside world out of his space.

He died of acute asphyxiation and starvation. He hadn't eaten anything for the entire week he was stuck in that box, and he definitely was alive. Strangely enough, even though there was no water to drink, Matthew was not dehydrated but thankfully only malnourished, that's what the forensics report said. I'll be glad tell him that when I see him.

In a potentially related issue, it is unknown whether Matthew has any links to the mass murders committed by Jon Townsend last week. It is unlikely Mr Townsend will be charged by police due to lack of evidence.

The only exclusive this reporter can report, is the videotape left behind at the motel, probably the last thing Matthew ever watched. Potentially explaining his strange behaviour in the days before his passing. This reporter shall watch it for my next column, next week. You've just got to wait patiently for another seven days folks - I'll have the results then.

Rover Johnson

* * *

Notes:

The scene with Matt in the woods, where the leaf chases him, and the scene with the grey world where he follows the woman,are both situated in Matt's head as they are both dreams. Neither actually happen but the second one, near the end, does to a degree as Matt is convinced of his surroundings and he is in the dream for his entirelast week. It's as though Matt's mind and Smara's willpowerkeeps his body alive throughout the experience.

I changed the paragraph where Annabel is run over by the minivan because originally it was toobrief and some of the people I showed it to thought the event passed them by without realising. If this is a cause of criticism please say, because I was trying to get a spontaneous effect that surprised the reader. I've got to say I've read this thing so much I'm not surewhether it works or not!

Any questions? Let me know. Feel free to e-mail me or post in the review section.


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